


Beaches of Penang

by Airdanteine



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Under the Red Hood
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-04
Updated: 2018-12-04
Packaged: 2019-09-06 22:24:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 14,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16841617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Airdanteine/pseuds/Airdanteine
Summary: Mystery-solving/Butt-kicking/Beach-kissing fanfic where Red Hood follows the Black Mask overseas to Penang to prevent a budding international empire, while Nightwing finds a bottle of crystal white sand inside of the mouth of a dead man with sleeves of snake tattoos, "Chinese Triad" written all over it.





	1. Chapter 1

_Too many nights ago, Dick saw Jason rise from the rubble._

_In a battle between Bruce and the newly returned Jason, they brought whole buildings down, their battlefield reduced to match the broken state of their hearts. Hurt, limping and clutching onto his gun for his dear life, Jason surfed through the sea of debris, moving far, far away from a buried Batman. When Batman finally rose himself, Dick saw Jason rush to hide behind a broken pillar, and Bruce search hopelessly over the expanse. He saw the failure in Bruce’s grimace, and the self-directed anger in the furrow of his brow through his mask, and Dick wondered if he should fall from his ledge, grab them both and force them to face one another._

_But Dick’s own leg was injured (thanks to Jason) and the cocktail of pain on both faces likely meant that was more than a bad idea._

_Dick didn’t need time. Dick had plenty of time sitting on his ass, figuring out this new villain of theirs, this Red Hood, was their Jason, and blanking out on what the hell to do with that information. And here Dick was, having finally clambered up onto the scaffolding of a nearby building just in time to watch the warehouse blow._

_Dick watched Jason finally inch out of the rubble and slide down a piece of still-standing wall. Jason took off his tattered domino mask, and Dick saw nothing but hurt in those watering eyes. Jason rose a hand to wipe his eyes a bit, which inevitably led to him clutching his face to weep._

_Feeling his own heart catch in his throat, Dick felt so useless, so trapped on his stupid scaffolding, a mile away from his weeping Jay. Hell, with every roll of Jason’s shoulders, every shudder of his jaw and every curling of his toes, Dick found it more than easy to forget about all of Red Hood’s sins, his broken leg, and three heads in a burlap bag._

_Dick just wanted to take him home._

~

Warehouses made for shitty homes. 

The first leap towards moving out is always rough, Jason reassured himself. When he first decided to leave the painful memories and the smell of death of his rotting family home behind at age 8, he was left to the streets, shuddering in alleyways and on rooftops, and tolerating the pure fragrance of funk inside garbage dumpsters when he crawled into them during the winter, empty or filled. But thanks to the pit, he was a full grown man now, trapped in this terribly strong, bulky body that required a bit more living space than your average trash can. 

So here he was, standing cleaning a Desert Eagle in front of his arsenal of guns hung and spread across the tall, massive expanse of a wall, with a mattress lain askew in a corner. That was his home. The rest of the warehouse was a mess of fixed shelves and cardboard boxes, and one day he’d get an apartment and transform the warehouse into his own batcave - and he technically could take his growing money pile and do that right away if he wanted to, but for now he’d let his cuts accumulate in duffle bags in a corner and lay the fuck low. No Jason Todds or Rason Rodds needed to be in any kind of registry at the moment. It’s been six months after he’d appeared as Red Hood, six months since Bruce figured him out and fought him in that dreaded warehouse, and Jason knew for a damn fact that Di-

That Nightwing, was still searching for him. Batman seemed to have resolved that Jason was unsavable, considering his utter lack of interest in anything Red Hood, which Jason himself kept on the downlow and far away from bat activity - but Nightwing? Perhaps he’d yet to receive the same resolution that Bruce did. Golden boy seemed to still have _hope_ , popping out of Bludhaven to come peek at him in Gotham. Keeping track of his activities, sometimes gaining ground, especially when Jason caught him witnessing one of his trades. Always pressing yet never actually punishing.

It was sweet, in a way, how much he still cared. Jason didn’t care. Jason does not care. Jason is the Red Hood now, and he was going to be what Gotham needed. Bruce seemed to understand that. But Nightwing? Perhaps he’d twirled a few too many times in the air, swirled his brain juices enough to not fucking accept the ugly, red-hooded truth before his fucking stupid fuckin baby blue fuckin eyes-

The sweat-slicked tip of his finger slipped within the trigger guard and it took Jason an extremely lucky microsecond to catch himself in time before possibly pushing the trigger. Fingers-no, whole body trembling, Jason slowly placed the gun on the table, skin peeling off the tight grip he was holding. He looked at his hand to see red marks on his palm, the imprint of the grip carved deep into it. He must have been really out of it, he thought, as a dull pain began to throb below the imprint. A distant sound of water sloshing against rock wetted his ear drums-but only for a moment, a light reminder almost, slowly diminishing in volume as he regained his senses. Jason blinked, wiping the sweat off his palm on his pants as he controlled his breath.

He had much more pressing matters than tangents about pesky vigilantes. One that liked to wear something equivalent to a gimp mask.

A few days ago, Roman ordered a hefty sum of guns to Bludhaven docks, one Jay only knew about through the hubba bubba of his own men, and some insiders amongst Roman’s sources. Now, Jason didn’t give a rat’s ass what Roman did in Blud - in fact he would actually _help_ Jason keep Nightwang a little busy, at least busy enough to keep his stupid pink-tipped nose out of his business. But the gun order was humongous, big enough to fuel a mafia, and Jason just _had_ to know what the Black Mask was up to. Whatever deal the Gotham crime lord struck was the Red Hood’s business. 

Jason holstered his now-clean guns as he tilted his laptop screen towards him, watching a blinking marker reach closer and closer to the docks. Tonight, Jason goes to Blud. And he’ll creep in the docks and watch Nightwing somersault his way through corrupt dockworkers and mooks, but most of all, he was going to find out what the Black Mask was brewing.

~

Reflections of pristine blue water danced in slow, sultry waves across Nightwing's face.

Perched on a window ledge, Dick saw a giant, empty fish tank glint and glimmer beneath him. Taking up entire length of the wall, it lightly lighted the apartment living room by refracting a strip of blue LED lights beneath it. The silence of the apartment was, in a way, a pleasant reprieve from the noises of a Chinatown weekend night accented with police sirens behind him. Like a pristine painting hung in a house of chaos. Fake plants swayed in the water. The filter whirred. A small plastic seashell peeped open and puttered water bubbles every few seconds. 

Blue light softly casted over the coffee table, revealing five dead bodies piled on top one another like an abandoned game of Jenga.

_”Three heads in a burlap bag,”_ a voice whispered in his ear, and Dick never felt a more overwhelming need to ensure that it wasn’t J-

That it wasn’t the Red Hood’s deed. He could still feel some strain in his leg, that constant reminder of what he’s done, and that he’s still out there, far away from home.

Dick took a deep breath, then immediately regretted it. 

_“No emotions. No weaknesses,”_ Bruce's voice whispered in his ear as he sputtered, attempting to get the smell of death out of his system. _“Only the Mission.”_

Holding his breath, Dick turned on Detective Vision, scanning the area with thermal sight. Affirmed that the only heat signatures in the room were the tank lights and gas emitting from the bodies, Dick relaxed his stance and vaulted over the fish tank, toes touching down on bloodied carpet. 

Grimacing, Dick crept towards the bodies and circled them, scanning them as he went with a sweep of his eyes. East Asian descent, early 20s. Long slash marks across the bodies, with rough marks on their hands and chests, and all of them seemed to share the same cause of death - deep, choppy cuts on their throats. 

“Machetes. Okay,” Dick thought, and found humour in the fact that honestly, if Red Hood didn’t use guns, he’d use some fucking machetes. Yes, it’s more likely that he’d keep on brand and fill his show-killings with bullets, but the Red Hood was the Red Hood, and he was immensely unpredictable like that. As Dick re-inspected the wounds, he figured a team of machete-wielders were required to take on five men like that. 

Or a Red Hood.

_Damn,_ Dick thought, as he resumed investigation, taking photographs with his domino. He had much more pressing matters than tangents on ensuring his psychotic loved one's innocence.

Dick stuck a finger between a particularly large gap in one’s neck, pushing through the blood and ooze to pull apart at the victim’s skin. The bone was cut. Seconds away from beheading. Dick bit his cheek as he took a picture.

Catching a peek of ink from the victim’s dress shirt, Dick rolled his sleeve up, revealing red and gold dragons swirling down his arm, heads circling around a medallion-like image. Six Chinese tusked demon masks encircling a coiled black dragon. 

“Oookay, new info,” Dick whispered, feeling an impending headache come his way. The Chinese triad in Blud was… absent at best, with only one group conducting smuggling ops at the docks that Dick busted now and then. Dick admittedly… didn’t know too much about them, only that they distinctively spoke Cantonese and… that’s it. The seeping pressure of a heartbeat against his head began to grow. 

Dick gently moved the arm towards light to take a photo - and caught a glint of blue on the tips of the victim’s fingers.

Moving in for a closer look, Dick spotted thin, translucent blue scales not only on the tips, but beneath the fingernails, coupled with a little blood. The scales were multi-chromatic, shifting between green, blue and an interesting blueberry purple. His hand smelled distinctly fishy. Dick looked at the empty tank, and noted how a bead of water ran slowly down the panel, leading to a soaked carpet beneath. Dick blinked his eyes as he took out an evidence bag and a cotton swab to scrape it all in.

Okay. So. A fish kidnapping happened. A fish-napping.

What.

To aid the the loud thudding in his head, police sirens finally came close enough to pierce his ear drums. Confident that the cars had stopped in front of the apartment, Dick knew he had mere seconds to figure it all out.

Figuring he should complete his autopsy, Dick surveyed his victims up close, trying to find anything amongst the hacked flesh. He opened mouths, searching for foreign objects from the bottommost victim to the topmost. A handy trick from Batman. And lo and behold, in the topmost mouth, he saw a small cork peek between the man’s teeth. Dick parted his jaw and pulled out a miniature bottle of fine, white sand. 

The most obvious piece of evidence that Dick did not find till the end. He was, of course, just too busy trying to exonerate Red Hood. Which was his usual pattern of analysis as of late.

Feeling the taste of tonight’s incompetence sit heavy on his tongue, Dick noted the sound of heavy footsteps marching towards the door, and someone trying for the knob - and that was interesting, the door was locked. The window was locked from the inside. Zooming in with his domino, Dick inspected the hinges - entirely untouched. In fact, the only damage to it was from the current slamming on the door. So, perps either sneaked through the front door, or the victims knew the perps.

Dick looked at the bodies. One hell of a thing to do to people you knew.

Dick looked towards the tank and took quick snapshots - more evidence never hurt - and he leaped for the window ledge landing perched. He took one last photo of one of the least theatrical, yet most confusing scenes before him, watched the police bust in and look at him with either shock or annoyance, and waved as he leapt into free fall.

Machete Killings. Fish Scales. Bottle of White Sand.

Dick looked at said bottle as he fell, crystals reflecting the moonlight above. He didn’t know what to make of it, but at least now he knew it wasn’t him.

~

Jason hated being wrong.

He was most certainly not wrong about the shipment - the dock was alive with hands exchanging big, bulky crates, looking as if it was a late night delivery. There was a surprising lack of enforcement at the coast and in the docks that night, and for all Jason knew, perhaps the cops were in it too. 

He was, however, wrong about Nightwing’s butt being anywhere near the scene. Jason could practically smell the confusion in the air from his rooftop perch - everyone was expecting him, but the man was absent. 

At this point, Red Hood _could_ technically do Nightwing’s job and shut it all down and it would make sense, but he wasn’t here for that. This was reconnaissance. A little intelligence gathering before making any big moves. But, Jason would admit, he was counting on Nightwing to thin the trade a bit. To make enough of a dent in the present to make things easier in the future. The way things were going though, an entirely new mafia the size of Gotham’s could form in Blud in a few week’s time. And Nightwing was missing.

“ _Damn,_ ” Jason thought as he looked through the scope of his sniper rifle, using it like binoculars. Burly henchmen worked like a trail of ants passing along crate after crate, the semi-organized lines leading to an unassuming cargo ship. On the emptying open-air loading deck lazed the Black Mask, speaking to a gleefully red-faced suited man whilst slinging his arms over the ship railing, letting cigarette ash fall to the polluted waters below. Considering Roman’s dislike of middlemen, the red-face man was a representative of the receiving gang, likely. The kind that gave wide, plastic smiles and dripped their words with warm, silky honey. 

Jason did not, excuse his French, expect the spokesperson to be East Asian. Sure, the docks were right next to Chinatown but that could have been a coincidence. Yes, there was some damn good sense in hiring Asians from Asia of any colour as your financial accountants and brokers, but the mafia were a deeply racially-exclusive organizations, ranging from the Irish to Italian. Jason would know, having grown up in the Sicilian-controlled Narrows. And Blud had no secular and multi-ethnic organized crime bands like Roman’s.

Only one conclusion. Triads.

Jason did his readings on every crime element in Blud before coming to class, which in the subject of Triads, were… a few sentences of threadbare information that showed more than it told. The utter lack of information or specificity on the Blud Triad indicated that it failed to build a workable American chapter to serve its international purposes, and thus its homebase and identity remained unknown to the American audience. No matter now, though. With all this ammo, the triad could burn its name into the heads of Blud’s crime bosses for good. 

Why Roman would even give a damn about Bludhaven Chinese Triads, however, was the big question. 

As Jason trained his scope on the grinning spokesman, he could make out what he was saying by reading his lips. A lot of useless small talk, unfortunately. A tonne of “thank you”s and “your contribution is well appreciated” and other synonyms to “say the word and I will suck your dick.” Jason was sure Roman had a lot more interesting things to say, but that damn mask showed nothing but the minute movements in his jaw. Sure, Jason could attempt to decipher the jaw movements, but nothing was more effective than the transmitter he brought in his jacket pocket. And maybe one beautiful day Jason will figure out a way to snipe a transmitter onto a person without piercing their skin and rendering the equipment useless, but tonight, Jason needed to get close _without_ alerting anyone.

It was possible. To some degree. There was no way he was making it across a brightly lit dock filled with henchmen in Red Hood regalia. Plan B was knocking out a stray man, changing into their clothes and working his way through the crowd of dockworkers to the boat, then wait till the Mask eventually left to join his men at the docks, then discretely plant the transmitter on the suit. He’d already done the first part - dockworker clothes and fish blood-stained galoshes sat beside his perch while the victim in question snored on scaffolding. The crowd of henchmen was big enough that one man wouldn’t be missed for a while, and Jason was right on that regard. But he eventually would be. Moreover, the complete and utter lack of Nightwinging had them on their hackles, nervously twiddling with guns and knives whenever their hands were free. The fools were on high alert.

Fuck Nightwing.

Plan A on the other hand was slipping by while Nightwing caused a distraction up front, and plant it. Then, when the vigilante eventually detected his presence, he’d give him a little gift and be on his way. Said gift sat heavy on his belt. A good old fashioned smoke bomb, the kind that left your eyes itching days after. It was a precise replica of Batman’s prefered smokey concoction, the smell of it enough to invade Jason’s senses with nostalgia as he was making it. A perfect message to confirm Jason’s identity as baby bro for the last umpteenth time, and keep Nightwing’s beady bird eyes out of his damn business. 

Jason tightened his grip on the rifle. The uniform ruffled beside him. Taking his eye off the scope for a moment, Jason looked towards the city as he thought over Plan B. 

Then the damn bird fell from the sky.

Of course, the moron was late, falling out of whoever’s apartment. At least he was nearby. Bruce imprinted a lot of things upon his first Robin, but discipline might not be one of them. Jason raised his sights for a moment to ensure Roman was still on the boat, then reassembled his sniper rifle into his double Desert Eagle configuration. Holstering them, Jason readied himself to drop down from the building, looking back at the city for a moment to ascertain Nightwing’s position, who was-

Running away? Jason’s jaw dropped to the floor of his helmet as he saw Nightwing casually bound away. Probably to go back to patrol.

Jason looked at the docks. Then at Nightwing. Then back at the docks.

“Oh my GOD,” Jason felt himself draw a deep breath, nose flaring in incredulity. No way. No fucking way. There’s nothing in Blud more important than this trade tonight, and Bitchwing was off. He’d probably go round the docks hours later for a final bit of patrol, and voila, the whole crew would be gone! Jason felt a vein twitch. 

“ _Go,_ ” said a voice so young and familiar that Jason had to back off the ledge a bit to gain back his breath. Fuck. This was no time for Pit-induced bullshit. “Go, go, go,” that voice chanted in his head, so pubscent, so cocky, so _himself_. An itch began to form in the back of Jason’s mind. He need to get down there. Do a few somersaults. Robin his way through the crowd and turn it into a concussed mess of bodies, enough to still crime in its tracks, only if for a night.

“Fuck me, fuckmefuckmefuckme,” Jason blurted rapidly as he watched Nightwing continue to traipse away. No. He was not fucking anything up tonight. He was doing it the right way, even if it killed him.

Dickiebird was gonna get his fat ass down the docks tonight.

Slipping a hand behind his jacket, Jason procured the smoke bomb, ripped the trigger off and threw it into the night air. 

And like an angel of vengeance, he came.

Jason had already dropped down behind some crates, enough to avoid being in line of sight of either party. He did take the time to witness Nightwing pierce through a thunderous cloud of black in the night air, escrima sticks out and ready for action. And as expected, the docks scramble _away_ from the boat. 

_Perfect,_ Jason thought as he swiftly darted between crates on the continually emptying side, moving like a walking ghost. It didn’t take long to reach the boat, transmitter between fingers as he hid behind a tall crate. As expected, Roman exited the boat and was on the docks, calmly directing henchmen while the spokesman huddled in a corner. The coastside wind blew at Roman’s blazer, lifting the coat tails up. It was too damn perfect. 

As Roman walked, Jason sprinted to a closer shipping container, waited a split second for the wind to blow, and planted the device on the coat’s underside before Nightwing kicked him in the face. 

Excluding the beginning, the perfection of all of it sang to Jason as he quickly climbed up the shipping container. He watched the man throw hands and squabble as Jason put in an earbud, and tuned in to Roman FM.

“TELL ME WHY YOU’RE IN _MY_ CITY!!!” Nightwing belted in Batman voice. Ouch. Okay, Roman _and_ Nightwing FM.

“Expanding horizons, that’s all,” Roman replied, voice smooth irregardless of getting the shit punched out of him. Jason could respect that.

“WHAT ARE THESE FOR?” Nightwing socked Roman square in the jaw before picking him up by the collar. Behind those white lenses, Jason could feel those sky blue eyes turn icy. Or, at least, he remembered them as a warm blue.

It’s been a long time.

While listening in was a good idea, Jason could be doing more with his hands as Nightwing fetched answers for him. Dropping down on the other side of the container, Jason grabbed a crate by the lid and pryed at a corner with his bare hands. Once the nail loosened out of the crate, Jason worked on the other three corners before quietly lifting it. Nonsense bubbled in his ears as Jason greeted the assortment of guns with glee, sticking one hand in to fish the invoice while the other picked up a rifle.

“WHO ARE YOU WORKING FOR?!?” Nightwing touted in his ear as he inspected the goods. Typical M4 carbine at first glance, but the barrel was fluted and scope was considerably more detailed. In the right hands, an army wielding these could bury territory lines in the sand. 

It was oh so Roman, pleasing partners with state of the art weaponry only he could provide - although in this case, there was a catch. As said, Roman liked to please, and that meant providing an arsenal that matched the receiver’s taste. Machine guns for Italians, sniper rifles for Russians, so on. Based on Gotham Triads, Jason expected weapons geared towards silence. Clean assassination through small gadgets or weaponry, or precise, powerful pistols. Hell, even if they wished to diversify, there should be a few ridiculously heavy duty carbines and double barrel shotguns in the mix, but as Jason read the invoice, it was all so… military. Standard issue equipment with some 21st century boosts. Jason would almost assume Roman just stole a military shipment, but the documented merchant names were no-name shell corporations, typical of illegal activity. 

Rather, again, the weaponry was oh so Roman. His aesthetic wasn't gimmick, it was technological superiority.

Interesting.

Jason pocketed the invoice, thoughtfully chewing on the info as he quietly slipped the cover back on. Jasin had gotten what he wanted and more, and he supposed he should slip out while Nightwing and Roman duked it out.

“Looking to go international? Maybe Hong Kong?” Jason heard Nightwing whisper, and it was close - ASMR style close, and Jason jumped in his skin. Shit. After telling the hairs on the back of his neck to calm down, Jason peeked from the side of the shipping container to watch the scene unfold. Roman's mask was tearing near his cheekbone, blood simmering from it as he struggled under Nightwing’s chokehold-which involved Roman’s own coat wrapped and pulled around his throat, brushing the transmitter right next to his mouth-and Nightwing was so fucking close to Roman’s ear. So close to the fucking mic.

“Sure,” Roman replied, sounding a tinge unnerved. Then Nightwing huffed. Almost laughed. Jason’s eyes _widened_ , something stirring at the back of his brain. For a moment, his vision blurred, and when his eyes finally focused, they met a sight his young, hormonal sight worshipped with every breath. 

His smile.

Bright, blinding white teeth. Big, wide, beautiful smile. That fucking singular dimple on the right corner of his mouth.

Jason leaned the side of his forehead against the shipping container, the edge pressing against his helmet, which invariably dug into his pounding temple. Through his wetting vision, he watched Roman’s hands go slack whilst wrapped around Dick’s wrists, having given up trying to pry the vigilante’s hands off his coat. Dick responded by pulling tighter, coming closer and closer towards the line between justice and unnecessary violence. There was a desperation in his voice, in the way Nightwing’s fingers grasped on the coat, the way he spat as he spoke. Something happened.

But through the pain, through the haunting husk Jason heard reverb in his voice shone an undeniable delight. The satisfaction that brought the cat back. Nightwing just made a connection of facts that mattered and was relishing in success.

A Robin’s smile.

Jason closed his eyes. That distinct sound of waves against rock at the midnight docks his mind had been blocking out began to permeate his senses, bringing him to a place far gone. A place Jason wanted to remain far gone. His mind instead supplied the sound with the feel of it all, the strange tickling sense of being submerged, the way ribs swelled underwater, attempting to keep him afloat. Then the feeling of his face breaking surface, cold air piercing his skin as he was lifted from the dark green murky depths. 

When Jason opened his eyes again, he saw green. Green crates, green sea, green Roman limping out of the scene, his heaving breaths loud in Jason’s ear. Green flashing sirens in a distance. 

And the most distinctive sky blue in his life flash before his very eyes. 

“No,” Jason blurted before he could properly discern his environment, but he could smell that undeniable musk in the air, the breath of his mouth near his nose. Is it strange to know someone by by the faint, nearly nondescript scent of their conditioner? Nevermind, someone he’d missed for 3 long years?

“Jay,” The Blue Devil spoke in his lilting, seductive voice and Jason felt sirens pull at his feet while he backed up against the crate, desperate to climb, run, get _away_. But the Night Siren was hanging from said crate, blocking his way, and the only way to run was by-

By-

With what little space he had, Jason stepped forward, so close to the Sky Angel’s face, so close till their lip ran parallel, before drawing his head back all the way and smashing his head into his.

Nightwing yowled, tumbling to the ground, and Jason swallowed the guilt that had become his staple grain. Jason clambered up a crate, the psychosomatic sluggishness weighing down his every step, nevermind the weight of his deed beginning to rest heavy against the back of his head. Jason gritted his teeth as he skipped from container to container, far, far away from water, far, far away from _him_. 

Once he was out, he’d be fine, he told himself. He had bigger fish to fry, especially knowing that Nightwing had some edge on the case too. But Jason knew Roman's shit from the inside out. The bird could take care of Blud all he wanted. Jason would bring Roman down, for good this time.

And Jason would slice off the source of his torment. No matter what it took.


	2. Chapter 2

“Fuck me,” Barbara spoke between gritted teeth, biting her tongue as her deft fingers flew across her keyboard. Oracle’s weapon of choice bent under the pressure, creaking with every press as they materialised Chinese characters on screen. Dick decidedly removed his hand from it's perch on her wheelchair handles, knowing for a fact that if he absently touched her in anyway during this state, he was gonna get his ass whooped, verbally or physically. 

“Couldn't you give me something more like,” Oracle waved a hand noncommittally as she thought of a word. “Popular? Relevant in the 21st fucking century?” Oracle rambled as her hand joined back in her search. The image of the tattoo pinged a few things in American criminal databases - in the early 1900s, with just as little information as its present biography. But that was the case for wholly different reasons. A single henchman was arrested for possession of drugs - a very specific poppy opium that ravaged the entirety of Gotham’s and Bludhaven’s Chinatowns. The arrest could have - _should_ have - led to the shutdown the triad’s operations in Blud, and progress towards that in Gotham. But no. 

Triads across the sister cities went _quiet._ The henchman was interrogated in the most unsavoury ways - punched, beaten and flayed, but he kept his mouth shut. By the time he slipped a name, the organization went out of sight - it’s waterholes, gambling dens and shophouses impossibly clean. Gotham’s own triads were frustratingly… efficient like that. As if a lot of pride was put into giving police a whole lot of nothing.

But Dick had something now. Their name.

Hei Long. Black Dragon. The clan may have made its minute mark on history, but its activities spanned across Hong Kong’s history, being a splinter faction of the original Chinese Triad during the Qing dynasty. It reigned supreme in the early 20s to late 30s, effectively dying with the other triads at the hands of Hong Kong’s Japanese occupation - exactly when it died in America as well. It built back its base in the 60s, the Hong Kong Triad Golden Age, but never really took flight as it once did.

Perhaps that was what they were striving for, by fucking with Roman, Dick thought. A chance to go international like it once did all those years ago.

But for now, while Dick stuck fish scales and machete mark pictures in the system, Oracle was tasked with hacking Hong Kong’s criminal databases to find recent activities and big names to take note of, which Barb greeted with glee at the thought of something challenging for once - only to receive the sheer tediousness of translating back and forth between American English and filing systems, and Hong Kong’s Cantonese and unique brand of organization. 

For example, America and the West had a weird fixation with its rigid first name last name structure, while Hong Kong had a mass of Mandarin, Cantonese, Hanyu Pinyin and mixed English-Canton name structures that made perfect sense to its countrymen, but fucked with the search oh so slightly enough to piss Oracle off. Dick just looked at the mass of characters and sighed, stopping his pacing to squat on the tips of his toes, holding his head in his hands as he soothed the pounding at his temples.

His first sign was knowing that the smoke bomb didn’t come from nowhere.

When Dick soared through it, he didn’t just smell the spice - he tasted that distinct powder before, that familiar choking sting. Dick has rolled the grainy texture along the length of his tongue too many times before - it brought him back to his days as Robin, brandishing his bomb, pulling out the pin as he looked up at B for approval, who gave a smirk only ever reserved for him. Tossing it with the flick of his wrist. Boom.

So he sought for him. After roughing the skull bastard up, he searched for him, thinking, no, _knowing_ that if Jason didn’t want to be found, he wouldn't be. 

But he did. Dick rubbed the throbbing bump on his head, not prominent enough to be seen, but swollen enough to hurt.

“Jason’s after us again,” Dick spoke aloud to no one in particular.

“Go figure,” Barb mumbled between bated breaths. After seconds of silence, Barbara’s finger slammed on, presumably, the enter key, and whooped as the light of white letters slowly flooded her screen. Dick watched the screen’s reflection off Barb’s glasses, not clear enough to read, but faint enough to watch a second light twinkle in her eyes. 

Laying his adoration to rest, Dick rose to lean on her wheelchair once again. Barbara grunted at the weight, but he knew she liked the warmth just fine.

“Here we go,” Barbara sighed happily, leaning back on her wheelchair as she got comfortable. She lifted a tired finger at the screen - which was filled with bodies of Chinese text, with one singular image for aid. Dick’s brain cycled through his intermediate Mandarin training, and found it very lacking. He looked at the screen, back at a tired Barb, back at the screen, and back at the now frowning Oracle.

Barb sighed as Dick raised a sheepish smile.

“How astute, Blunder Wonder,” she murmured as she pressed control and + on her keyboard, enlarging the page on screen. 

“Clarence Chan. Hong Kong-based big boss of the pack from 1996 to 2018. Ran Hei Long out of financial ruin to relative stability in the early 2000s, only for it to recently lose prominence. Late 50s. Had one kid, sighted exactly once,” Barb motioned at a picture of a scanned polaroid-a whole clan of members, Chan sitting front and center next to a woman. One small child sat on the lap of said lady, expression indiscernible from the pixelated quality. “Chan died two weeks ago,” Barbara’s voice cut through the atmosphere, raising an eyebrow at the last word. Okay, code received. An empty space at the head of the throne was the perfect ground for an internal strike, and said kid would be grown up by now.

“That explains lack of force of entry,” Dick mused as he hopped over to the console right of Barb, pulling up pictures of the room. “Perps entered the room as friends, maybe even had the key. Entered the room,” Dick found himself stepping towards open space behind them, imagining the layout of the room before him. “Surprised them, then cut them to pieces.” 

Dick felt chills run up his spine once again. The very thought of anyone being capable of hacking into proverbial brothers left Dick squirming.

Perhaps that was because it hit too close to home.

“Then,” Dick walked to their central desk, and turned on power to the light microscope Dick had momentarily abandoned to hover around Oracle. “They arranged bodies one on top the other, and stuck this,” Dick picked up the bottle of sand, holding it up to look at the fine, twinkling white grain, “in the topmost mouth, leaving this” Dick absently finished as he picked up a nearby piece of paper, one embedded with sand. He found the tiny paper rolled and buried within the bottle, one when unravelled, said ‘Come Hither’ in blue ink. From what both Barbara and Dick could discern, that meant come to wherever the sand came from. Where it came from was apparently obvious to the true receiver, but literally just white sand to them both.

Dick placed the bottle back down to bend over the microscope. He squinted at the scope for a moment, looking at a smear of sand on the plate. He’d taken an image of it and run a program to determine grain size, kinds of grain and eroded sea life-corpses, what not, details that were essentially unique fingerprints of every beach around the world.

“And you’d know where it came from if you checked the screen,” Barb motioned at the giant monitor next to her giant monitor, which now blinked with a popup message that read “Matches Found.” Dick sheepishly scrambled to his keyboard, closing the popup to look at the results.

“How long was it up?” Dick stuttered as he read the text before him, ears red with embarrassment. Blunder Wonder indeed.

“A few minutes. Chill,” Barb spoke, eyes back on her screen. The tone of her voice however indicated concern, the scary kind that dug into his mind and whispered, ‘I know what you’re thinking.’

“Well,” Dick cleared his throat, straightening himself to read the text. “Grain size, density, shell fragments and microbiota composition indicate somewhere around… Southeast Asia?” Dick questioned, voice perking at the region’s name. In retrospect, it made sense, as Triad activity was spread throughout Southeast Asia, but it was still not something Dick expected.

“This just identified the region,” Dick spoke, hope picking back up as he clicked a through a few menus on screen. “If we narrow down the search we might find the exact country-” 

“Do that,” Barb interrupted as she sat up straight, and Dick swore he could see something come alive in the furrow of her brow. Recognition, almost. A pattern.

“Barb?” Dick whispered, his voice soft and nonthreatening in his attempt to poke the beast. 

“Southeast Asia. Girlfriend!” Barb’s exclamation cut through the silence, reverbing within their underground safe house. 

“What?” Dick exclaimed, cheeks flushing pink as he tried to rationalise, unsure who that title was directed to.

“His girlfriend! Look-” Barbara waved frantically at the screen that Dick could not read. He could however see her profile image- a tall, tan woman wearing a cheongsam, the same woman in the polaroid. “Malaysian and Malay. She wasn’t sighted often with Chan, immigration records state she visited Hong Kong a few times for few weeks at a time. Chan’s flights were private and blocked, but records state he went out of country for long periods of time,” Barbara looked straight at Dick, blue eyes piercing his own.

There was a theory here. One that involved islands, beaches and bastard children.

“We’ve got nothing on the kid, but I’m betting you he stayed with mum,” Barbara spoke at the speed of light, “Chan visiting here and then. If we could figure out _where_ -“ Dick’s monitor flashed light grey, indicating second analysis complete. Dick’s hand darted for the mouse, closing the popup to reveal the location.

“Teluk Bahang, Penang Island. Malaysia,” Dick spoke.

“Dick,” Barbara looked right at Dick, her focused eyes demanding full attention. Dick’s ears perked up.

“The machete marks,” Barb motioned a finger at Dick’s screen, and Dick pulled back up the picture of slice marks. 

“They’re not machetes,” she spoke, her eyes now darting back and forth him and the computer as she resumed typing at a frenetic pace.

“They’re similar to machetes,” Barb spoke as she wrote, “But the slice is longer, way longer, and there’s a stronger curve to it.” Her finger slammed on her left mouse button, and a picture of the murder weapon pulled into view. 

“ _Parang_ , a blade native to the region,” Barb spoke, growing quieter. “The local Malay gangster’s choice of weapon.”

Both grew quiet, musing over the evidence.

“Dick, this is more than just a show killing. The man who ordered this is screaming, ‘I am Malaysian. I’m a Malaysian gangster.’”

 _”And this is definitely not Jason,”_ Dick internally thought, a little disgusted with himself at how his shoulders relaxed, despite the gruesome scenery before them.

“And I’m betting your round, plump ass it’s that kid right there,” Barbara’s finger pointed accusingly at the polaroid, at the child sitting on his mother’s lap, ignoring the incredible blush forming on Dick’s cheeks. 

“His dad is dead. Sharks are coming for his head. And this kid, this heir, now grown, is building a new base. Bringing them to his territory for a fight. Bringing them to his home,” Barb finished, fingers clasped in satisfaction. Dick did the math in his head.

“He’d be only 20,” Dick whispered, looking right into the kid’s eyes.

“Yeah, but, that’s never stopped anyone before,” Barb murmured, lower than it had been ever before all evening. Dick closed his eyes, feeling a searing pain travel through the back of his brain.

Semantics aside, they now knew were they were going. 

There was, however, one loose end.

“So,” Dick asked, fake-chipper voice cutting through the atmosphere. “They waltz in, butcher their friends, leave a bottle telling them to come hither, and… steal a fish?” Dick asked, walking towards the table to pick up an evidence bag of scales. The florescent lights reflected off the surface of the large, broken scale, and Dick marveled the colours once again, that strange purple emanating flits of blue, green and even subdued pink. 

“Now that we know who, what and where they are, I don’t even need to blink,” Barb spoke, a cheeky quality sneaking into her voice.

“That,” Barb swerved around to meet Dick, smile cocky and finger pointed at the scale, “is an Arowana.”

“An Aro-what now?” Dick asked, part-confused, part-amused.

“Arowanas are large, long fish native to South-East Asia. Very expensive. Precious to the Chinese elite as they look like dragons,” Barb spoke as she ignored the pun, turning back to her keyboard and typing as Dick leaned over her wheelchair. She pulled up an image search, where dozens of large, long fish greeted him of all kinds of bright, vibrant colours. One blood orange with golden scales, another brilliant vermillion with contrasting dark-blue scales. Dick looked back at his real scale, watching the greens and blues dance before holding it flat behind sunlight. Without reflection, it was that distinct blueberry purple. 

“That one’s rare,” Barb spoke, and Dick caught her leering at him at the corner of her eye. Dick sulked - the scale was pretty, okay? On the other hand, Dick caught Barbara close what looked like a Wikipedia article at the corner of _his_ eye. Barbara shifted uncomfortably. Touché. 

“Bukit… Merah… blue Arowana,” Barb spoke as she typed, and pressed enter to showcase a myriad of blue-green-purple fish with golden underbellies. Dick scrambled for a tweezer, picking out the scale to hold it against an image. It first didn’t seem too close first, the colours shifting too much to match, but when Dick held up a hand to block light to bring out that lovely purple, it was identical. Having concentrated so long on determining the main colour, that he didn’t notice the golden outline of the scale. 

“It’s purple, not blue,” Dick murmured as he ~~drooled over~~ inspected the scale.

“Heh. You know what’s more confusing?” Barb spoke, smile wide as her cunning eyes twinkled at Dick - the very expression Oracle wielded when she knew she knew everything.

“What?” Dick asked, finding every reason why he’d ever loved her in that smile. 

“Merah means red,” She winked, as she typed out an address.

~

Merah means ‘red’ in Malay.

Bukit Merah, on the other hand, meant Red Hill - both a name of real locations across Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia, and of a fictional hill in maritime Southeast-Asian folklore.

There was a tale of a fishing village in Singapore, where fisherman would set out to sea to make their living. But at certain times, when the tide was high, swordfish would come leaping out of the water, diving sharp-nose first into the bodies of anyone foolish enough to be out at the coast. It painted the beach red with the blood of people, staining and staining as the days went on. The village leader weeped for his people. Warred against the fish, which only brought more men down as it kept coming, and coming, and coming.

Then one day, a boy who lived on a house on a hill came down to witness the mess below. He had an idea.

“Chop the stems of barren banana trees and plant them along the coast,” the little boy told the village leader. “When the tide comes, you’ll see.” So the village built a fence of thick stems along the coast, and when the tide came in, the swordfish soared towards the coast and bam! Stuck their noses into the stems, flopping about uselessly until they died. The swordfish swarm died hoard by hoard, and at last, the coast was clear. The grateful leader awarded the boy with praise and recognition. The boy was denoted the smartest, the kindest, the most cunning that the village could offer. He was a superstar.

But then, jealousy struck. A rival of the village leader resented the boy. The boy had, after all, made the leader more popular, seen as wise and competent for finding such talent. The rival wanted to rule all of the village, and now the reality seemed dimmer, all because of this thin, lanky, scrawny boy. And so one rainy, stormy, monsoon worthy night, he and his men came marching up the hill, into the little boy’s house, and butchered him.

And mixed with the rain did the boy’s blood run down the hill, painting it red. Red Hill. 

“Bukit Merah,” Barbara finished, voice somber. She’d started telling the story rather clinically, as to quickly pass time as Dick began his stakeout, and give a little context. The truth was in the pudding, or rather a fish scale, for there was indeed a Bukit Merah at Teluk Bahang, Penang. Barbara meant no harm.

It did anyway. There was one boy they knew who’d painted the hills of Gotham Red. Dick clutched on a branch. 

“Deep breaths, Wonder Boy,” Barbara spoke, and perhaps, Dick was indeed hyperventilating. His heart rate had surely skyrocketed. Dick followed instruction, taking in deep breaths through the nose, and out through the mouth. He gave himself a moment to concentrate on anything else-Butterfly Farms. Cat Beaches. Yes, Penang had these two very prominent establishments, both concepts that delighted Dick to unimaginable degrees. Yes. Kitties on gorgeous white sand beaches.

The white sand of this beach in Penang was crystalline, so painfully pure that Dick couldn’t accurately judge if it was man made or truly natural. Walk further away from the sea, and you’d see the sand mix with craggy gravel, the rickety kind that told of old age more than mistreatment. The land went up-always up, up and up above sea-level, and a certain road shrouded by thick masses of tropical rainforest trees meandered and curved into a driveway. One that belonged to a tall, red mansion.

 _Istana Merah,_ said the gate sign. Under, in smaller font, _Bukit Merah_. 

But yet, the ground was still white. It was the castle that was red. Between purple fish and white beach, Dick reckoned whoever named these things must have a very special kind of colour blind. Or forgot to take off their rose-tinted sunglasses.

When Dick first found the ‘Istana’ - a rather fancy Malay word for palace, often reserved for parliament buildings - he breathed a sigh of relief. There were way too many places called Bukit Merah across Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia for his liking. And again, the thing was fake-red. 

The mansion itself was classic colonial british architecture reserved for its administrative buildings, but painted red rather than classic white. Not a hint of brick-instead, the craggy cement texture was not unlike the road. Dick wouldn’t put it past the Triad to ‘repurpose’ previous colonial buildings.

Built for the weather, the architecture was based on an ‘open’ concept-every floor of the 3-storey mansion had a connected corridor running the circumference of the building, like a secondary way to walk in and out the floor. The ground floor was, well, empty. Like a stilt house, the ground floor was nothing but cement pillars, with two flights of stairs on opposing sides. The pillars and design of the outer building was however classically Roman, with ionic orders pillars, spiky corinthian volutes and tall arched window panes with facades and niches and all that stolen Greek jazz. The roof was, however, not classically flat - they were gently slanted orange tiled roofs, the kind of orange tiles so distinct to equatorial colonial architecture. Necessary to fight against that tropical rain. The dull red of the building clashed with that shade of orange tile, but the aesthetic was likely kept for the local connection.

Fancy buildings aside, the open concept and airiness of the building meant Dick could more than easily infiltrate the place, let alone spy. 

Which is exactly what he was doing.

A considerable lack of Gothic concrete meant Dick was perching on tree branches like the true bird he was to peer into the second floor. Deciding he’d rested enough, Dick turned on Detective Vision, noting a few moving heads and zoomed in on the scene. He could see a tan man lain at the head of a long table, several henchmen surrounding him. Tattoo artists hovered over their extended hands, inking something into their wrists. 

Dick couldn’t quite make it out, but he could see they were very specifically inking at what Dick had come to know as the gang’s membership card of sorts. They all had red and gold dragons trailing down their forearms, circling a curled black dragon on their wrists. The six demon heads Dick found on the victims were special-perhaps some ops unit, Dick wasn’t too sure. Either way, black dragons, or Hei Long.

The man began talking, henchmen guffawing in kind, and Dick figured he needed to get closer.

“I’m going in, O,” Dick huffed into his receiver, and Barb gave a quick affirmative.

Dick watched men mill into the building and out to walked the corridors, their synchronised patrol near perfectly rhythmic. Very efficient, but very convenient. Dick just needed to count the six seconds it took for the frontmost patrol guards to duck into the building to shoot out his grapple and climb onto the balcony railing. Dick hopped up to cling onto the lowest rung of the roof, foot resting on a pillar. Heads milled under him, wielding large machetes-no, _parang_ that glinted under the setting sunlight.

Dick crept into the building, clinging onto the scaffolding on the inner base of the roof. He made his way across the long hall-like room, hanging surreptitiously over the head of the table. The mob boss continued to lazily smile at his body of henchmen, breaking out into laughter only to be held steady by his tattoo artist. Dick held a snicker. He swore he could see the artist slightly chide him, and the boss curl his mouth into a frown, annoyed. He looked so intensely young, and Dick could even assume the tattoo artist, an older Malay man, had an almost Alfred-like authority over the boss.

Nathaniel Chan, son of Clarence Chan. A much too young man at the head of a self-made throne.

Dick tuned on Detective Vision, looking closer at the focus of the tattoo guns. The needle danced across the black dragons on their wrists, leaving behind trails of rich green. The sounds of moving mouths started up again, and Dick tuned in his comms earpiece to amplify surrounding sound. 

“Oi Macham,” Chan called out, looking at an Indian woman sitting to his right. 

“Macham? Like…” Dick spoke into his receiver, wracking through his dwindling fluency in Romany. “Like Matchi? Fish?

“That’s in Romany or Hindi. Macham is Tamil for ‘bro,’” Barbara’s voice rang clear, and Dick was forever grateful.

“Right-hand woman,” Dick noted.

“Likely. He’s saying that wrong though. Like he read it somewhere,” Barb noted as the woman looked up at her boss with distinct annoyance. Dick’s mouth curled up.

“How about,” Chan mused, flipping the handle of his _parang_ between his fingers. “Ikan Arowana?” Chan’s head tilted to a side. The entire table of men and women looked up at Chan, then delved into various reactions ranging from groaning to guffawing. Dick had to quickly dial down the volume.

“He said Fish Arowana. ‘Ikan’ is often used to name fish dishes though,” Barb chuckled into the receiver.

“Uh. So they’re laughing at eating Arowana?” Dick mumbled, out of his depth. He’d become too American.

“No, I think Chan was attempting to rename their group,” Barbara spoke, and Dick had to stop himself from snorting.

“Okay, so,” Dick pressed his lips together, trying to dispel his smile. “He’s rebranding.”

“Makes sense.” Dick looked at the scene before him, trying to remember that this was a Chinese Triad.

The original plan was to follow his target, Nathaniel, to his headquarters, and implement various strategic attacks to effectively dismantle the organization, but as Dick watched men and women of varying races, many mixed, armed with _parang_ and rebranding their tattoos, striking now would be counter-intuitive. Dick had no illusions that Chan would later expand, but now, with everything he’s done, Dick expected Chan to draw back from America and into Penang. The other side of this brewing intra-gang war, however, were the ones with actual roots in Blud, confirmed with Roman’s appearance at the docks. It all snapped into place.

Chan’s tattoo artist leaned back, taking his needle off the tattoo for the first time Dick had seen that evening. He set the tattoo gun down and pulled out a smartphone, screen bright with notifications.

“Chan,” His voice was deep, wispy, and Dick dialed up the volume as he watched the man lean into Chan’s ear.

“Your uncle is here,” he spoke, then stuffed his phone back into his pocket and resumed tattooing. Chan’s face was grim, mouth set in a thin line. 

Dick got the gist. What was war without battle.

Dick had a feeling, by the time he’d figure out what exactly to do, he’d end up mopping a beach full of blood.

~

From up in the air, Jason saw no Red Hills.

He did instead see thickets of bright green vegetation that portrayed the classical wildness of tropical rainforests, impossibly clear blue water washing white foam upon the shore, and pure-white sand beaches-this region of Penang seemed specifically, well, perfect. Like a goddamn paradise. It also had a biodome called Butterfly Farm, and a part of their beach was a Cat Beach-a friggin beach for cats. This was paradise incarnate.

Still no Red Hills though-

“See. No Red Hill one,” A voice grunted to his fellow passengers behind him, voice gruff, rough enough to indicate an expiring voicebox. But if Jason turned around, he’d see a shockingly young man, mouth pressed thinly in a grim frown. Eyes dark and heavy. At first glance, he kind of looked like himself-but if Jason looked too close, he’d see a kind of dejection that Jason wasn’t too comfortable with.

Jason did not dare turn his head though, no sir. Face covered in flight helmet, goggles and other gear, he kept his pilot guised eyes on the helicopter’s controls and windshield, catching glimpses of the Triad Boss through momentary reflections on the cockpit glass. 

Who said the Red Hood couldn’t be discrete?

Just a microsecond later, however, the boss caught him looking. Jason mentally cursed. They locked eyes-their reflection eyes, and Jason decided to upturn the corners of his lips in what he hoped looked like a distracted smile. The man looked amused as he frowned, before rolling his eyes and looking away. Ah, right. Acknowledging eye contact and smiling was a Western thing, but probably seemed crazy to the more socially strict East Asians. Like, subway lunatic please-don't-lock-eyes-with-me crazy. Jason did his research.

Enough research to expect Roman’s accompanying presence.

Roman audibly grinned through his mask and pressed back into his seat-one directly behind Jason’s. Roman was completely obscured, and Jason could only tell what he was doing through auditory cues and small presses against his seat. That shot Jason’s paranoia through the roof--a kind of crawling discomfort that curled and settled into his gut, screaming at him to take a good look. But Jason had to peer through the alarms in his brain and focus. On. The. Mission.

Jason peered back at the boss, watching him roll back a sleeve, turning his arm to show Roman, on which his Hei Long dragon tattoo was proudly displayed. The Red, The Gold, and the Black Dragon. Hei Long. But unlike most mooks, He had six demon heads circling around his coiled black dragon-Jason’s eyes squinted at that, matching the heads to a recent Bludhaven homicide.

Five bodies were found. Jason briefly looked up to see the boss’s face. He was the sixth.

“We were knights,” the boss spoke, mouth set grim. “My brothers,” he looked down, withdrawing his arm to stroke his stubbled chin. He tapped his foot, eyes lost deep in thought-before suddenly looking up at Roman, body going completely still. 

“I was going to replace them though,” He spoke, then broke out into deep guffaws. Jason felt Roman’s chest vibrate with laughter through the seat. 

“So,” the boss recovered, finger pointing at Roman. “You’re here with me. I understand. You’re a man who likes to do your own work.”

“Yes,” Roman replied, his fine Gotham Elite accent muffled by his mask. The boss smiled an eery, shark-toothed grin.

“Good, good,” he clapped his hands together. “Eh,” the boss continued, hand disappearing out of view in what Jason presumed was the boss brushing Roman’s knee. Jason felt Roman shift back.

“You thinking to do any,” the man made gun hands, waving them as if they were firing. “action?”

“Perhaps.”

“Good!” The man gave a wide smile, then shifted to look at the beach, getting bigger and bigger as they drew closer and closer. Jason pulled up on the flight stick, causing the helicopter to dip down, getting ready to land.

“I hope you do” the boss looked up and mask, eyes dark. “We do it...on the beach.” The boss looked back at the sights, mulling. Jason took note, hoping that decision wasn’t tentative.

“But first. I want to go to this ‘Butterfly Farm.’”


	3. Chapter 3

The blood of an insect is clear.

Sticky and clear, like drying elmer’s glue. It’s a rather uneventful colour. Especially when denoting the death of beautiful, breathtakingly fragile butterflies. 

Dick peeled a butterfly corpse off the back of his hand as carefully as he could, taking a moment to indulge in the wing’s beauty-largely black, with pale minty green streaks and cells painted vertically down the wing. Dick placed it on a palm, and blew it away.

Chan was screaming, directing platoons of gang members to either put out the fire, or form a frontline. Dick turned the volume down on his comms to both drown out cries and sorrow, but to concentrate on the scene before him. He was balancing on a tree-again, this time one grown in a tall biodome. The hole in the white tent fabric covering the done was blown open, wind surging into the facility and blowing dead butterfly corpses out into the Penang night air. While discovering the bombing of the Butterfly Farm through wings in the wind would have been very poetic, the eruption of fire into the night sky was message enough.

“The butterfly you blew,” Barbara rang into the comms, sounding a little unhinged. Dick grimaced, remembering she could tap into his domino lenses at any time.

“It’s called a Great Jay,” Barb spoke. Dick’s face immediately scrunched into itself.

“Thanks, Barb.” 

“If you look below you,” Barbara continued, and Dick looked down before he could catch himself.

“That whole enclosure holds–held, a variety of ‘Jay’ butterflies,” she finished, Dick reading the name signs as she spoke. 

“Love you too, Barb,” Dick sighed, then turned his attention back to the screaming mob boss. The yowl of fire engines were closing in a distance, but it seemed like Chan and gang was going nowhere. With the way they’d effectively found water supplies and were hosing the place down, possibly in time before the real cops came. Dick groaned-more complications. 

Something began to irk at the back of Dick’s brain, and a sound akin to the whine of keys scratching against metal became louder and louder, pausing and playing in slow waves of sound. Furrowing his brow, Dick searched the scene before him, watching the hands of gang members holding their _parang_ tremble violently, dropping them to the ground. Dick zoomed in on the metal of the weapons, watching how they shook to the beat of the sound.

“Greetings,” a voice rang through the chaos, and Dick snapped his head up to eye a familiar black skull.

Roman. Mother _fucker_.

Dick _immediately_ curled further into the foliage, desperate to not be seen. Roman was a conniving bastard, ever knowledgeable, ever watching. He gave Dick a persistent paranoia that coarsed anxiety and adrenaline through his veins. 

“Don’t worry,” Roman spoke, then fiddled with a device in his hands. The sound stopped abruptly.

“Who are you?!?” Chan shouted, picking his weapon back up. Dick watched Roman raise his hands in surrender, that black mask of a face blank in expression.

“Just a squire,” Roman spoke. Chan’s face screwed in confusion. “A squire, to a knight.” The distant stomping of men preceded their entrance, a mixed army of White and Chinese men armed to the teeth pooling behind Roman in alarming numbers. 

Chan grimaced in recognition. Dick frowned, filing the terms for later. 

“I’m just here to tell, that ‘Uncle’s’ arranged a date for you,” Roman’s British-tinged elite accent grated on Dick’s ears, his amicable tone laced with malice.

“Monkey Beach, tomorrow at dusk. Don’t be late,” Roman bowed, making his exit, his men . Chan’s supposed right-hand woman charged with a battlecry, pulling out her pistol to aim it at Roman’s expensive suit. Chan immediately darted forward-clasping around her middle, drawing her back. Chan whispered into her ear, and she stilled, nose still flaring as she fumed. 

Dick clenched his jaw, gritting his teeth. This was all happening too fast, with Roman’s involvement a known fact, but his presence still surprising and additionally worrying. Roman didn’t _need_ to be here if he was just supplying weapons and men, yet here he was anyway. Dick cursed. 

Either way, as Chan and gang turned back to headquarters, Dick needed to turn in as well, recoup, clear his muddled brain and _think_. 

Dick slowly climbed down the tree, dropping to the shadowy, butterfly-ridden mud flats below. 

A stark sheen of bright red glimmered in the corner of his eye. Dick whipped around-and immediately staggered back, taking in the menacing glare of the Red Hood.

“Fuck,” that growly brass of a baritone huffed, and Dick made the very rational choice to pounce on him.

“Whatthefu-” that deep New Jersey inflection, the way his voice rasped was pure music to Dick’s needy ears. Jason hiked a leg up to push at Dick’s shoulder, but Dick only grasped onto him tighter, intent on keeping the damn slippery-ass ex-Robin in place. 

“Jason,” Dick breathed, pushing through fighting limbs to gasp Jason firmly by the shoulders, pushing him to the ground. Dick’s face breathed close to Jason’s helmet, foreheads almost touching.

“RED. HOOD,” Jason seethed, and Dick felt the combined imprint of both Jason’s feet push into his midsection–and bam! Dick felt the wind knock out of him as his back thumped onto the ground. Dick scrambled up, watching Jason clamour out through a small burnt hole. Dick quickly got onto his feet, running towards the slowly disappearing silhouette. 

Dick rocked his feet back for a moment, eyeing the tear in the tent before launching forward, clearing through. He skidded messily on the ground, eyes darting across the dark streets, cluttered with masses of firemen, gang members and civilians.

“Look up,” Barb barked, and Dick shot his head upwards to spot that blurry flash of red again. Careful to avoid the expanse of humans before him, Dick shot his grapple up into a nearby tree, a rainforest monstrosity amongst a whole heard of similarly huge, tall and thick trees, and jerked the gun, swinging upwards. 

“Locked in for you,” Barb spoke, and an erratically moving red target mark appeared before him, ruffling through the dense foliage. Dick pounced forward-he had to be quicker, quicker than he’d ever been, quicker than when he’d first chased the Red Hood, complacently relaxed under the ignorance of the hood’s true owner. 

Dick’s arms screamed as he curled them inwards one more time, darting forward to finally have a clear sight on Jason’s rippling tan jacket and shiny, stupid hood. Dick just wanted to rip. It. Off. Dick swung his hips forward, legs pointed straight in front of him, then releasing his grapple to surge downwards and place a swift kick to the helmet. 

Jason yelped like the true puppy he was, tanking through the branches with Dick close behind. They hit ground in seconds-Dick rolling on the soft sand, skidding to a stop. He quickly got up-and immediately felt an immense strain in his still-injured leg. Dick stumbled backwards, catching himself at the last second.

Dick straightened himself as soon as he could-to see Jason stand still, looking at him. His helmet hid all emotion, but his body language was eerily still, and still stiff as Jason resumed a fighting stance.

“I just need to talk,” Dick blabbered, fully aware that that was a lie. He just wanted to _hug_. 

“Fuck off,” Jason spat, launching forward. At least, Jason was engaging him. Dick ducked down and placed a swift counter-kick to Jason’s chest-it was Jason’s turn to go flying backwards, landing with a thud that send sand swirling around them. Thank god for eyewear. Dick kept his distance, letting Jason get back on his feet.

Perhaps that was a mistake-Jason was lightning fast, fainting a step to Dick’s left before dashing forward into Dick’s right, cracking a fist across Dick’s jaw. Dick stumbled backwards, feeling blood pool onto his tongue. Dick shook his head, ignoring the temporary vertigo to grab onto Jason’s jacket, clawing at the fabric, and pull him closer to bash his head into Jason’s. 

Jason stood still this time, unrelenting. _Fuck_.

Dick felt Jason’s hands snake onto his shoulders and grip hard on the kevlar-spandex, and Dick responded in kind, knocking bruised foreheads together in a classic brawl. Dick gritted his teeth as they pushed against one another, biceps curling and thighs screaming, feet kicking into the less ideal sand. Dick could hear nothing but the blood pumping in his head, the internal screams of anger, or anguish, of pleas and cries begging Jason to just-

Dick heard the soft, near whisper of a mewl cut through his thundering brain.

Dick felt Jason go slack too as they both turned to look at the source of the sound-a small black kitten watched them with beady, bright green eyes, pawing lightly into the ground.

“Oh god,” Dick whispered, eyes scanning the expanse. “Cat beach.” Kittens and cats littered the expanse of the beach, some gathering in bunches and other clearly scampering away at the squabble in front of them. Dick turned to look at Jason, who while face was again impenetrable, but body unguarded. They huffed together, foreheads still touching. A lethargy traveled through Dick-and suddenly, his injured leg gave way, and he was bucking.

Dick felt a large hand grasp onto his back, slowly his descent to the ground.

“Dickie?” Jason’s voice called out, and Dick swore he could hear a vulnerability through the damn filter.

“Do you,” Dick spoke, clearing his hoarse throat. 

“Do you want to just...pet some cats?”

~

Jason let the black kitten nibble on the tip of his glove. It took the invitation to clamour onto his hand, gnawing relentlessly at the leather. It’s as if the scrawny thing had no concept of politeness or personal space.

Dick was laying on the sand, catching his breath. Cats curiously padded towards him, one prodding at his knee. Dick winced, shifting it, and Jason had to look away for the moment. Jason could, had been replaying the moment Red Hood and Nightwing first fought, Jason making his get-away with a planned bomb. 

He didn’t think. He didn’t think Dick would let himself be caught by it. 

“So,” Dick asked, voice raspy. Jason closed his eyes for a moment, took a deep breath, and looked at Dick. 

“What are you doing here?” Dick continued. Jason had to huff at that.

“You know why. Roman,” Jason spoke, and Dick’s mouth pressed into a thin line.

“Yep.” Dick simply said. Silence ensued for a few moments, 

“What are you-” Dick paused, taking a moment to clear his throat. “What are you going to do.” 

“What do you think,” Jason seethed between his teeth, feeling his hackles raise. 

“You can’t–you shouldn’t–”

“I am. When they crowd that fuckin’ beach, I’m blowing them up into pieces-”

“Jason!” Dick’s eyebrows shot up, slamming a palm to the ground. Jason couldn’t take it-the shock in Dick’s body language, the way his face scrunched into apprehension, disgust, rejection–

“It’s the only fucking way, Dick!” Jason shook the kitten off, ignoring the offended mewl, and leered into Dick’s space. It’s times like these where he wished he showed his face, to show Dick a deep sneer, show him how much _disdain_ he had for Boy Scout talk. “You don’t understand. You never understood-”

“What is it, Jason?” Dick waved his arms wildly, exasperated. “What don’t I understand?”

“What you don’t understand, _Dick_ ,” Jason growled, “is that I’m not fucking squeaky clean like you are, Boy _Fuckin’_ Wonder-”

“Who the fuck says I am?!?” Dick growled, voice pitched deep to match Nightwing’s commanding tone. Oh. He sees how it is.

“Aww. Circus boy thinks he _gets it_.”

“I do, motherfucker! I grew up in the dirt, just like you!” And Jason knew that, of course, but. But–

“No, dumbass! I mean the bloody, dirty, the fuckin thing inside,” Jason repeatedly jabbed a finger into his temple, feeling a foam form at the corner of his mouth.

“The _violence_ , Goldie. The fucking,” Jason grabbed at his helmet, where his hair would be. “The fucking. The fucking _crime_.”

“Jason,” Dick’s voice with jarringly gentle, and no, no, Jason did not have time for _pity_ -

“Crime, Dick! I was born into it!” Jason shouted, body shaking. “You can’t stop crime. You can only,” Jason gestured, clenching both fists together. “Control it.”

“Jay-”

“I can’t–” his voice cracked, feeling a surge of vulnerability overcome him. The Green. He was seeing green again. Green sky, green sea, green everything except for that frustrating fucking pacific blue bumblefuck before him. Jason clenched his eyes shut. “I can’t. I can’t–”

“Shhh,” Dick’s voice soothed, and Jason felt a surge of bodily warmth, then a pair of careful hands softly trail down his back. Dick’s breath was close to his ear piece, and while he wasn’t completely pressing his body into Jason, he was, technically hugging him.

Jason leaned into it.

“Oh, what did the Pit do to you,” Dick whispered, and there was a surprise. Looks like Bruce did figure it all out. Those careful fingers snaked up to the base of his helmet, and Jason felt a gentle pressure.

“Take it off, Jason. You need to breathe,” Dick whispered, and Jason complied, flicking back a latch and letting Dick pull it off of him. His skin was sticky with sweat, and Dick helped wipe that embarrassing spittle at the corner of his mouth, gloves brushing sand across his cheek.

“Jason,” Dick asked, and Jason opened his eyes again. Dick was _so_ damn close to his face. Dick took his fingers off Jason for a moment to peel his mask off, fingers returning to stroke his cheek almost immediately. 

Drowning was a touchy subject for Jason. He however felt no qualms about drowning in Dick’s gorgeous baby blues. This was, perhaps the first time he’d seen Dick without the mask since the Pit, and it was beyond amazing, how Dick at 20 looked exactly the same as Dick at 26, youthful, glowing, breathtakingly gorgeous.

Dick’s fingers brushed the edge of his domino, smiling to himself.

“Can I take off your mask?” Dick asked, and Jason leaned into his hands, signaling consent. Dick’s fingers worked the glue behind his mask, slowly peeling them off.

“Oh,” Dick gasped, and Jason blinked-brain jolting from lethargic emotional depletion to immediate over-analysation.

“Wha?” Jason mumbled, eyes searching Dick for any sign of disgust. Instead, Dick seemed...dumbfounded?

“Jason, you’re _beautiful_ ,” Dick spoke, and Jason felt his face flush, blush burning at the tips of his ears. Their faces were so close, and Jason may have never done this before, wasn’t given the chance to grow up, to experience this, but he was still smart. He could see the way Dick’s pupils blew out, glancing ever so often at Jason’s lips.

“Kiss me, Jay,” Dick breathed, and Jason complied.

They tumbled backwards–lips crashing, teeth biting, and whatever innocent intention either had was quickly tossed to the winds. Dick was pressing hard, tongue tip poking at his teeth, and after ample delay Jason deduced the gesture and opened his mouth, letting their tongues intertwine. 

Jason may be on top, but Dick was clearly leading, grasping onto Jason’s jaw to pull it open and _eat his mouth_. Jason moaned into the slide of their tongues, feeling at mercy to Dick’s superior experience–

Dick pressed a knee between Jason’s legs, and Jason’s snapped his eyes open. Ah. He knew all about _that_.

“Dickie,” Jason wrenched himself from Dick’s grasp, trailing his hands down Dick’s chest and up his raised thighs, grasping tight onto his knees.

“Strip,” Jason commanded, and Dick’s pupils widened dangerously.

“The cats are watching,” Dick whispered, but he was smiling, zipping his suit open, peeling the fabric off his his broad shoulders, his gorgeous chest, pushing them to his waist. Jason helped pull it completely off, then tossed it with reckless abandon. 

Of course, the sexy, sensual Nightwing went commando. Jason took Dick’s hard cock in his hands, letting Dick squirm under him. He didn’t stroke-rather, Jason lowered his head, aligning his lips to Dick’s hole.

If there was one thing Jason was going to Dick tonight, if he was told he only had seconds to please Dick before it was all taken from him, then it would be this. 

Jason spread Dick’s cheeks wide open, and slid a long, wet lick across his hole.

Dick yelped as if the sound was wrenched from his throat, and Jason took it as a compliment. He continued to press and prod, making that hole all sloppy and wet, circling a thumb along the sensitive skin here and then. Dick’s moans were music to his ear, so unadulteratedly _frantic_. 

“Jason, Jason,” Dick moaned, his hands clutching the back of Jason’s head-and that just drove him buckwild, pressing into Dick’s hole and bobbing his head, tongue-fucking him for dear life. Jason hummed and groaned, causing Dick to jitter uncontrollably. 

“Jason,” Dick was _pleading_ , such a gorgeous sound. “Jason, fuck me. Fuck me,” Dick grasped Jason’s hair harder, wrenching his head up. Trails of spittle dripped down Jason’s jaw as he sleazily smiled at Dick, which seemed to only annoy him further.

“No lube, Dickie,” Jason whispered, getting back up on his knees and unbuckling his pants. 

“I can take it,” Dick huffed, pupils unfocused. Clearly, the moron was thinking with with cock.

“Don’t want to hurt you, Dickie,” Jason pulled his cock out, heavy and hard, and slid it across Dick’s hole. 

“Don’t want to hurt you anymore,” Jason whispered, almost like an admission, before slowly thrusting back and forth, feeling Dick’s hole clench on the underside of his cock. He grasped Dick’s cock in kind, jerking him off. Dick hummed in satisfaction, and Jason could feel in the way Dick’s thighs clenched, the way his hips snapped up the the rhythm of Jason’s hand, that he was close.

“Cum, baby,” Jason whispered, thrusting harder and faster against Dick’s hole. Dick drew his hips back, snapped up, snapped up again, and cum flooded into Jason’s fingers, Dick spurting and spilling himself dry. With a few more hard and quick thrusts, Jason came, drawing back slightly to press his cock head against Dick’s hole, letting the cum seep and pool.

Dick propped himself on his elbows, sweat dripping down his chest as he looked at Jason, eyes hazy and mouth curled in a satisfied smile. Jason smiled back–then felt something curdle in his gut.

Oh _god_.

He shouldn’t. He. This wasn’t the _plan_.

“Jason?” Dick must have detected Jason’s sudden withdrawal, for he sat on his knees, placing his hands on Jason’s shoulders. Jason _hated it_ –how much his body yearned to lean into Dick, to capture those lips once again–but no. No. Jason was gonna. He was gonna.

“I knew you’d be here,” Jason found himself mumbling, unable to control the words coming out of his mouth. Dick frowned, and god, if there was going to be anyone who looked _good_ while frowning, it would be Dick. 

“I was gonna,” Jason whispered, voice small. The words echoed in Jason’s head. _Fuck Nightwing_ , Jason had thought, not too long ago. He was gonna. 

_He would slice off the source of his torment. No matter what it took._

Torment. Dick. Torment. Jason dared to look into Dick’s eyes, and Jason could see it. Torment. But Dick was no longer the Torment. Dick was. Dick was.

“I need to go,” Jason grabbed his helmet and scrambled to his feet, making himself tidy as quick as possible. Dick called after him–but Jason had already turned his back, pace speeding into a sprint.


	4. Chapter 4

Dick uselessly thunked his head against a tree trunk.

He was sick of wet trees. He was sick of the always damp grass, the way his suit clung to his skin, how Dick had to tolerate powder baths to combat his ever-secreting sweat under this damn humidity. Everything he thought was wonderful about Penang was ruined–the Butterfly Farm was in literal _ruins_ , while even the thought of the Cat Beach had Dick thunking back his head again.

At least, as Dick ran his fingers through the crystalline sand, he still had this. That is, until it would be desecrated with blood.

Dick watched one side of the beach mill with a mix of Hong Kongers and loud Americans, cocking their guns and taunting their enemy with loud, abrupt claps and clanging of metallic objects. Roman’s pitch-black bobbing head stuck out between the crowd, and with a little zooming, he could see him very clearly holding out that vibrating device.

The other side, his side, were tying bandanas around their mouths, loading guns and absently fiddling with their _parang_ , loosely in formation, but pacing. Chan was again in the frontlines, like a dumbass, and his right-hand stood by him, fist clenched and fierce. She reminded him of Kori, both dark-skinned, brows always furrowed in unshakable determination.

Meanwhile, Dick was _again_ perched on a tree. God. He was so sick of it.

“Focus, Wonder Boy,” Barb’s voice rang though the comms, and Dick hung his head in shame. An a bit of embarrassment. He duly hoped Barb had shut off video feed and muted him during…his “sudden expression of passion.”

Dick felt like he should be more confused about that. He wasn’t. In fact, the facts were clear as day. He loved Jason. He wanted to fuck Jason. And Jason was never going to let that happen again. 

Dick nearly thunked his head again, but decided against it, and turned on Detective Vision. 

He’d been scanning the beach with deep-seated paranoia–but he couldn’t find any bombs. Nothing dangerous except for pointy seashells and rough dead corals. Whatever Jason was planning, it wasn’t anything Dick could prevent. Unless… 

Well Dick had no choice, did he? There were only two things he could do. When Roman used that device, he was going to finally make his appearance and grab at it, then find and persuade Jason to not do whatever he was going to do. And if he failed…he failed. 

At the faint hint of orange in the sky, Dick sat up on his heels. The sun began to dip. 

Women and men _roared_. 

Dick’s side was a bit more clever than he’d given credit for–they came out with guns blazing first, and when close to an enemy, made quick, deadly, practically unavoidable slashes into their guts, limbs, wherever. They were clearly more practiced than Roman’s and ‘Uncle’s’ mooks. The truth, however, was that both Uncle’s and Roman’s men were undeniably bigger, heftier, and more experienced with skirmishes like these. They were evenly matched. It was buying Dick time, distracting them enough race his way along the heat of the battle. 

As he got closer, he could see Roman, encircled by a group of his own men push through. With a raised hand, he flicked the device. 

Dick dove in, catching it with ease. 

Dick did not like how loose his fingers were. 

In the thick of battle, Dick saw Roman look down at him as he skidded to the ground, expression annoyingly indiscernible under his mask. Men and their fucking helmets. Roman did nothing as Dick quickly switched off the device–even motioned the henchmen head straight towards him to fall back, and walk him out of battle. 

Dick felt a familiar large hand grab onto his arm. 

“Get out of here,” Jason breathed, voice thunderous through the modulator. “Get the fuck out of here. Now.” 

Roman continued to stare at Dick, until no longer in view. Dick looked up at Jason, body stiff and palming a handheld device. 

Ah. 

“Nightwing,” Jason seethed, gripping harder and shaking his arm in increased violence. “ _Dick_. Get the fuck out of here. Now.” 

“No,” Dick spoke, voice faint. He cleared his throat. “No,” he repeated, letting confidence ebb out his throat. 

The din around them was thunderous, kicking up more and more sand until it swirled like a whirlwind around them, a man-made sandstorm. Dick, without sufficient filtration like Jason’s helmet, choked. 

“ _Dickie_ ,” and Jason was pleading now, voice upping a pitch. It broke Dick’s heart. 

“I can’t, baby,” Dick grasped onto Jason’s hand, voice perhaps failing, but his resolve absolute. 

“Babe,” Jason whispered, pulling Dick towards him into a hug. Dick rested his chin on Jason’s broad, broad shoulder, letting Jason think he was oh so discreetly sneaking his fingers towards Dick’s pressure point. Dick swiftly kneed Jason in the stomach, who curled into himself with a huff. 

“Damnit, Dickie,” Jason groaned, clutching the bomb to his chest. An idea. 

“Jason,” Dick scrambled next to him, who looked up warily. 

“If you’re going to throw a bomb at someone,” Dick began, pausing to cough. 

“You should throw it at _him_.” 

Jason paused to look at Dick. He couldn’t believe he was approving this, but. It’s not like Dick hadn’t already taken lives. A particular laughing maniac’s, which Bruce resuscitated in time. 

That was a discussion for another time though. 

Jason made himself quick, going full Red Hood as he sprinted forward in Roman’s direction. Dick counted the seconds. Three. Two. One– 

The explosion was hot, unbearably hot. The heat and the rising fire and all the damn sand had Dick choking, crawling into himself to make a pocket to breathe. 

A hand tugged at Dick’s arm, and this time, he budged. 

~ 

Jason had never known a more persistent cat in his life. Well, kitten. 

The black kitten with the bluest of eyes nibbled on Jason’s pants, pausing every so often to climb onto his thigh. Jason made no move to help. It’ll get there. 

Dick’s head rested on his shoulder, and it always amazed Jason, how much _taller_ Jason was now to him. The Pit had it’s few benefits. 

“Are you going to do anything to Chan?” Jason asked, and he was almost sorry, for Dick slid off his shoulder for a moment to think. 

"You were there, when he was putting out the Butterfly Fire,” Dick mused. 

“Yeah.” 

“I think,” Dick looked up at Jason, eyes imploring. “That they might be needed here. That they can,” Dick paused, searching for words. “That they can control it.” 

Jason stared, completely speechless. 

“What are you going to do about Roman?” Dick asked, and that was a whole other thing to worry about. The explosion had his and Uncle’s men retreating, which was great, but Roman’s dead-or-alive status was unknown, which was not so great. Jason would have to tackle that problem as it came. 

Dick smiled, understanding, and rested his head back on Jason’s shoulder. Both their toes were tucked in warm white sand, clear once-blue water now various shades of peaches and reds reflecting the strong equatorial sunset. Red to purple light descended down the sky, draping over both of them like a comfortable blanket. 

“Let’s go home, Jay,” Dick whispered. His voice was a deep rumble against the soft fizzling of foam waves fading into the shore. He sounded relaxed, almost sleepy. At home. Frowning, Jason willed himself to accept the implications, feeling Dick’s hand on his thighs, his breath against his skin, and his lovely long lashes fluttering against his neck. Jason squeezed Dick’s elbow, hoping that it would tell him he felt the same. He too felt the safety of each other’s arms and the warmth of their bodies pressed against each other. He too felt lov- 

A flash of terror ran through him, jolting him awake. Grateful that Dick didn’t witness this moment of cowardice, Jason distracted himself by drinking in the scenery again. 

No more running. After all, in moments of terror, the only way to run is to… 

“I think I’m already home, Dick.” Jason finally spoke, feeling a great weight lift from his chest. The unspoken question hung between them. Are you home too? 

Jason felt Dick’s body go still, and in response, so did Jay’s. He struggled not to clamp his hand down Dick’s elbow, biting his lip instead. Jason’s eyebrows knitted uncontrollably, dread and anger and all things vulnerable clashing against his mask of aloofness. Dick drew his head from the crook of Jason’s collarbone and that’s it, he’d misread everything, he’d taken it to far, he’d thought he’d found a home- 

Dick took his face in his hands and looked at him with eyes so bright and hopeful and...proud. 

“Yeah,” Dick said, and Jason swore he heard a slight quiver in his voice, then confirmed by a small sniff and a building glint in the corner of his eyes. Dick pressed soft lips on Jason’s cheek. Jason’s eyes fluttered closed, his cheeks warming against the cool night air. 

Dick resumed cradling his head under his chin and tracing shapes on his thighs, which should be no different from what he was doing seconds ago. But it had. 

They’re finally home. 

[ ](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16837108)


End file.
